On Friday afternoon, I go splurge at Whole Foods because I’m not cooking cheap food for Greyson—I just couldn’t. So I bring home a brown bag full of healthy and fresh items, slip on the only apron I kept—a frilly yellow one from Anthropologie—and I cook a homemade dinner for him because it just seems like a nice “welcome home” thing to do.
Menu-wise I went for arugula and pear salad with goat cheese and a light vinaigrette, my special pasta pesto, a loaf of homemade bread, and apple tarts dusted with cinnamon for dessert.
I’ve always done my best thinking when I’m cooking. This time as I’m chopping and prepping the food, I think of how I’m slowly beginning to recognize my own needs, as a woman, needs I’d never realized were not being met by sleeping with a dozen different guys, needs that couldn’t possibly be met until you make a real connection—scary, powerful, inexplicable—with someone. Someone you least expect. Greyson’s face haunts me—serious, smiling, thoughtful. I can’t stop recalling and replaying his different kinds of smiles. The smirky one, the sensual one, the indulgent one, the sleepy one, the flat one he gives Pandora, and the one that’s almost there, but not quite, as though he won’t give himself free rein to give in to it . . .
I love that best.
Because it feels like I’m pulling it out even when he doesn’t want me to. Like he’s yielding something to me he didn’t plan to give me.
“Something smells good around here and my bet is that it’s you.”
My blood soars when I recognize the warm, smooth voice behind me. Somehow, Greyson got inside and crept up on me! Without making a single noise. And now he slides his big arm around my waist and spins me around, the move placing over six inches of bad boy with his lips only a hairbreadth away from mine. My senses reel as I absorb his nearness and slide my hands in a fast, greedy exploration up his thick arms.
“Hey,” I gasp, “I—”
He kisses me for a full minute.
A minute and a half.
Our lips moving, blending, my knees feeling mushy because his kisses are better than anything I’ve ever had. And now I can’t think or talk or hardly stand on my own two feet.
He pulls away and I feel myself blush at his heated appraisal. “I like this,” he whispers and signals at my apron, and the delighted light in his eyes makes me feel like I just won top prize on Iron Chef—and he hasn’t even tasted my food yet.
“You’re going to like it even more when you realize I plan to feed you dessert myself,” I whisper. His dirty mind seems to get the best of him, for he looks instantly ravenous. Laughing, I urge him down on one of the two stools at the end of the kitchen island. “It’s not what you think, it’s actual food!”
“Are you taking this off for me?” He tugs the sash of my apron.
“Maybe if you finish your food like a good boy.”
He chuckles, a rich, full sound, his grin devastating, taking over my brain. “You like it better when I’m bad,” he points out.
Biting back my grin, I pull out the pasta dish with a glove, aware of him noticing that I’m only wearing a short dress under my apron—maybe he can even see I’m wearing no panties. The thought sends a tingle through me.
There’s a silence and a creak of the stool as he leans back, kicks off his shoes, and there’s a confused, almost amused tone to his husky voice when he speaks to me, rubbing his jaw as he watches me wind around the kitchen. “I keep wondering what you’re doing all the time.” He pauses, then, his voice lower and thicker than ever, “You miss me?”
“What kind of question is that?”
He gives me a roguish grin. “One I want to know the answer to.”
I return the grin with one of my own as I serve us both, and when I set down his salad and pasta, he clamps his bare hand around my wrist. “Do you?”
Our eyes meet, and he gently stokes a growing fire in me as he rubs his thumb along the inside of my wrist.
“Do you?” he asks, softly.
“Yes,” I whisper. I trail my free hand across his jaw and impulsively lean over to kiss his cheek. Adding, near his ear, “A lot.”
He watches me like a predator as I go take my seat on the stool across the island.
We smile at each other, those smiles that seem to spread our lips simultaneously; from the moment we met it’s always been like that. I notice, at last, that he’s brought wine, and I watch as he pops open the bottle, searches my cabinet for glasses, and comes back to pour a glass for me, and another for him.
We clink glasses, smiling, and before he drinks, he murmurs, “To you, princess.”
“No, to you,” I counter, taking a sip.
“You like going against me, don’t you,” he purrs, still swirling and sniffing his own glass.
I laugh and suddenly I feel like the sexiest thing in existence as I start to eat. As if my every move is meant to entice him, excite and exhilarate him.
Not even my breaths escape his notice.
I feel him look at my fingers, my bare arms, my bare shoulders, my lips. I fork some salad and watch him tear off a piece of bread and stick it into his mouth. We sip quietly, watching each other, savoring each other’s company. The look of each other. The energy of each other. I’m a decorator who believes in feng shui. I believe in yin and yang. I have never felt such a yang to my yin. Ever.
“Do you like the meal?” I ask him.
“Am I the first man you’ve cooked for?”
I narrow my eyes, sipping a bit of red wine for courage, but there’s no cure for the nervous spinning in my stomach. “Truth? Yes. You are. So think very well about your answer,” I warn.
“Every spoonful was as delicious as you.”
I smile. “Really?” Feeling insecure, I check his plates and notice he’s wiped them both clean.
He edges back, and his gaze drops from my eyes to my shoulders to my breasts. “I’m ready for dessert.”
“Wait, mister, I’m not finished. I have some actual dessert that’s not me, you know!” I twirl some pasta onto my fork a little faster and ram it into my mouth, licking some pesto off the corner of my lips.
Greyson watches me intently, and he looks so big, dark, and sexy in my apartment, I’m not accustomed to the deep little pangs of longing springing up inside my chest.